This is a riveting account of a year spent swimming in various waters round the UK, with lots of information on the history of swimming, the evolution of our species, local sites, sundry water-lovers & rule-defiers and an entertaining selection of swimming lore to enrich Deakin's account of his own swims.
A big thank you to Nik Lane for sending me the book. I'm not just grateful for a good read, but for two lessons learnt: that I am far from being alone in my compulsion to swim; and that it's possible to write engrossingly on a subject which, "on the surface" doesn't seem too promising.
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What's so attractive about Deakin's book, and what makes it such a wonderful travelling companion, is – apart from its pin-sharp descriptions and deep humanity – its subversiveness. This act of swimming in the wild, away from "health and safety", unsupervised, often unobserved, is, in some essential way, a quiet act of defiance."
